Archive for May, 2013

While Twitter has become a wildly popular new means of communication, it has not been without its critics. Questions like, “What can we say that is meaningful in 140 characters?” and “What are we losing by keeping our social interactions so brief?” have abounded since Twitter’s inception. The value of brevity, however, is not a new concept. In the late 19th and early 20th century, one of the most efficient ways to transmit important information rapidly over great distances was the telegram.

Telegram authors had an incentive to be brief – most telegram companies charged per word. As a result, authors took some common shortcuts used in the Twitterverse such as dropping pronouns and articles and using abbreviations and code words to maximize information and minimize characters. So forced brevity in communications isn’t really a new concept at all. In fact, telegrams were often used to convey life-changing news-births, deaths…

Fun stuff, stuff to make you cry, serious stuff, weird stuff. Here, a recap of all the coolest stuff on the interwebs this week.

More than 60 percent of 1400 Boy Scout leaders voted to lift its longtime ban on openly gay scouts. [The New York Times].

A fantastic piece by Carl Zimmer on how studying rare diseases can help mainstream medicine. [The Atlantic].

Listen to the only known recording of Virginia Woolf’s voice. [Paris Review].

Some cool visualizations of the world’s tallest building, which will be 838 meters tall and in an empty field in China. [Quartz].

Dexter Johnson begins a column in which he explores the origins of “seven or never,” a principle in nanotech that says any new technology appears on the market in seven years or not at all. [IEEE Spectrum].